🎩 Dearest Readers,
Our review of Novi Community School District (63100) continues — this time with the district's General Fund budgets.
And before we begin, an important piece of context:
Novi is not currently showing an audit crisis.
The district's June 30, 2025 financial statements received an unmodified audit opinion. The audit notes adoption of GASB 101 and a prior-period correction involving capital assets, but neither resulted in a modified audit opinion.
So this is not a story about Novi being financially insolvent or its auditors sounding an alarm.
It is a story about where the district's General Fund appears to be heading, and where its budgeted spending is changing.
📜 Let's follow the numbers.
💰 2024–25: Essentially Break-Even
Novi's final 2024–25 General Fund budget anticipated approximately $104.03 million in revenue and $103.99 million in expenditures.
The audited results ultimately came in at:
Revenue: $104,079,336
Expenditures: $104,251,802
That left expenditures exceeding revenues by $172,466.
After transfers, the General Fund declined by only $84,520, finishing the year with:
🏦 $15,417,631 in fund balance.
On a General Fund exceeding $104 million, 2024–25 was essentially a break-even year.
But then the picture changed.
📉 2025–26: From Balanced to a $3.73 Million Projected Deficit
In November 2025, Novi's budget still projected an essentially balanced year:
Revenue: $106,972,980
Expenditures: $106,972,981
Projected ending fund balance: $15,471,631.
By the June 25, 2026 final budget, however:
Revenue: $106,103,667
Expenditures: $109,836,003
Projected shortfall:
🔴 -$3,732,336
Projected ending General Fund balance:
🔴 $11,536,494
Between those two budgets, projected revenue fell by roughly $869,000, projected expenditures increased by approximately $2.86 million, and the projected ending fund balance fell by roughly $3.94 million.
📉 2026–27: Another Deficit Is Projected
Novi's initial 2026–27 budget projects:
Revenue: $109,004,963
Expenditures: $109,618,426
Projected shortfall:
🔴 -$613,463
Projected ending fund balance:
$10,923,031
Put those figures together:
🏦 June 2025 actual: $15.42M
⬇️
🏦 June 2026 projected: $11.54M
⬇️
🏦 June 2027 projected: $10.92M
If those budgets play out as projected, Novi's General Fund balance would decline approximately $4.49 million, about 29% from its June 2025 audited level.
That is not insolvency.
But it is a trend worth watching.
And naturally, Lady Budgetdown had another question:
🧐 Where is the additional spending going?
🏛� School Administration: +31.6%
Comparing Novi's 2024–25 final budget with its 2025–26 final budget:
$5,124,990 → $6,742,243
Increase:
🟢 +$1,617,253 | +31.6%
That is a substantial one-year budgeted increase in the category Novi identifies as School Administration.
But it is not the largest dollar increase.
📚 Added Needs: +28.7%
$12,811,107 → $16,486,078
Increase:
🟢 +$3,674,971 | +28.7%
Other changes include:
📖 Instructional Support Services
$7.96M → $8.71M
+9.5%
🏢 Central Services
$3.45M → $3.88M
+12.5%
💼 Business Services
$1.30M → $1.35M
+3.5%
And an important distinction:
General Administration actually declined slightly, approximately 0.9%.
So it would be inaccurate to simply say that every administrative category increased.
Meanwhile:
📚 Basic Programs: approximately +0.1%
👥 Pupil Services: -2.2%
🔧 Maintenance / Operations / Security: -8.3%
🏘� Community Services: -13.5%
Overall General Fund expenditures increased approximately $5.84 million, or 5.6%, between the two final budgets.
But the growth was clearly not distributed evenly across functions.
And there is some longer-term context worth remembering.
Our earlier review of Michigan Department of Education data found Novi's Business & Administration spending per pupil increased from $879 in 2014–15 to $1,694 in 2024–25, an increase of 92.7%.
During that same decade, Novi's pupil count increased approximately 4.0%.
Novi's separate 2025 compensation disclosure also gives us a glimpse of the leadership structure represented among employees earning $100,000 or more:
1 Superintendent
3 Assistant Superintendents
9 Directors
9 Principals
4 Assistant Principals
5 Supervisors
1 Dean of Students
That does not establish that Novi has "too many administrators." Determining that responsibly would require comparing administrative staffing and FTE levels with similarly situated districts.
But the public records do establish something worth watching:
While Novi projects drawing down its General Fund balance, its 2025–26 final budget increases School Administration spending by approximately $1.62 million, or 31.6%, compared with the prior year's final budget.
That is not a conclusion.
It is a number.
And readers are perfectly capable of deciding for themselves what questions that number deserves.
Next, we'll open the independent audits and see what the auditors themselves had to say.
📜 Sources: Novi Community School District audited financial statements and General Fund budgets; Michigan Department of Education financial data; Novi Community School District public compensation disclosure.
Data compiled and analyzed by Lady Budgetdown using publicly available records.
With receipts and respect.
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